Day 1: I’ve Started A Blog Now What?

I have officially started my blog! (I hope you already have noticed this or you wouldn’t be here)

Prior to purchasing the domain name and hosting for my blog from BlueHost, I was really focused on having some posts saved up to fill my pages while I get this blog started. However, I did not actually put thought into how to create this blog. Meaning, how to design or edit my blog to be more user friendly once I purchased a domain. Let me tell you! I was so confused! If you would like to start a blog through BlueHost, you can do so through my link here: www.bluehost.com/track/livingfullyandfree My link will give you special pricing starting at $3.49/month!

After purchasing my domain I was feeling pretty helpless since I didn’t know what to do to get started. But hey, I promise to be honest about this journey so I figured a mini series detailing my experience of starting this blog would be helpful to those of you who may want to start a blog in the future. Now I don’t want you to worry too much because I know I can do this. Google and YouTube have been my best friends and I plan on including some websites I found helpful when building this blog in future posts. Just some insight, I have practically no prior experience with creating a website, and even though WordPress already has most of it laid out for you, a technological dummy like myself can still experience issues. My basic thoughts while working on designing my blog:

Yay! I finally purchased my domain name and have hosting services through BlueHost!”

“What do I do now? Awwww, my site currently says coming soon! What is a theme? What is a widget?!?! How do I do this? What was I thinking?!?!? I am so in over my head!!! Help me!!!! *posting on Facebook* Anyone? Help? Please!!!”

At this point I became really lucky because one of my best friends, who also happens to be a graphic designer, happens to help me out! (Show her some love and check out her amazing portfolio here: MeghanKennon)

Me: “Friend!!! I don’t know what I’m doing! I am completely lost! How do I add a Pinterest button? Why can’t I add a footer? How do I write a disclaimer section? How does copyright work? Do I even need copyright at this point?” Friend: “Let me help you find a theme that has the social media buttons built in! You can worry about the rest afterwards” Me: “Yay!”

Now I am 3 hours into this blog making business (after having actually bought my blog) and we finally have a new theme enabled! But then I noticed that my name was appearing as a bunch of letters and numbers in all my posts. So I did some digging and I fixed it to show my name as Amanda. That’s a win in my book!

Plus! My friend helped me install a new theme on my blog so now I have options for social media buttons! Hooray!!! I successfully connected my personal Pinterest page and my business Twitter account. I need to figure out the rest though since Instagram is not being helpful and I haven’t created a business Facebook page yet.

Overall, I consider tonight a building block success in my book! I am going to call it a night and have listed my to do list for tomorrow below! Looking forward to our future together! Thanks for reading my nonsense! I promise that my intent for this blog is to have high-quality content posts for you to read and share. But really, what is the harm with having a bit of fun along the way with this mini series right?

Amanda

Post navigation

5 Comments

Well done for getting started Amanda! I love the design, it’s very clean and easy to read. Keep going, it can get hard at first but once you start to see people reading, it becomes worth it. Give me a shout if you need any more help.

Thank you for being my first commenter Lloyd! I don’t know if I have already done it, but I am definitely giving your blog a shout out in one of my upcoming posts! Thank you for supporting me in my journey as well!

I strongly encourage you to start your blog and let me know when you do! I plan on posting a tutorial pretty soon on how to use BlueHost to get started so hopefully that’ll help you get started! Thanks for reading along!